THE
LAST THINGS - part 3
HEAVEN & HELL
Incorporeal things are not in place after a manner
known and familiar to us, in which way we say that bodies are properly in
place; but they are in place after a manner befitting spiritual substances, a
manner that cannot be fully manifest to us."
[St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Supplement,
Q69, a1, reply 1]
This is quite a
philosophical statement so don’t worry too much if it doesn’t fully make sense.
But I show it to you so you know where I am coming from!
WHERE
IS HEAVEN? WHERE IS HELL?
·
It
is better (as St Thomas Aquinas suggested above) to begin by thinking that
heaven and hell are less places and more to do with a state of being. When we
die our souls do not, as such, go to a location but rather are in a state of
being.
·
Pope
St John Paul II explained this in some of his Wednesday audiences in Rome. He
said that if we imagine them as places we immediately limit them to our
temporal order in which they do not belong.
·
Both
Heaven and Hell are eternal destinations, and no one travels from one to the
other. Fallen Angels (Demons) cannot be redeemed and Angels of God cannot fall.
Saints cannot sin in heaven etc.
·
We
of course use images of things we experience in this temporal order to try to
explain what heaven is like, or hell is like. After all Jesus did this. He
talked about Hell as Gehenna which was the rubbish dump of Jerusalem where
there was always rubbish burning (and incidentally where the previous occupants
of the land had performed child sacrifice to the ‘god’ Moloch – it was a place
of horror for the Jews). Jesus also talked about heaven as a banquet or wedding
feast (remembering wedding feasts went on for days for Jews!).
ERRORS
ABOUT HEAVEN & HELL
·
Most
people in our secularising society believe one of two things:-
·
“Heaven
and Hell do not exist and there is no life everlasting.”
·
“Hell
might exist but hardly anyone goes there; and pretty much everyone (and their
pets) go to heaven.”
·
“Hell
is not eternal but where the soul is extinguished.” RESPONSE ® of course we
don’t like the idea of anyone going to hell, but God has given us eternal
souls, this means they cannot be extinguished.
·
“Heaven
isn’t worth thinking about too much, what you need to do is get on with making
this life better!” RESPONSE ® This can lead us to sleep walk
in to hell – for we cannot earn heaven through good works – we need to know who
saves us and what He asks us to do in order to be saved in Him!
WHAT
IS HEAVEN?
·
Heaven is the transcendent
dwelling-place of the living God
·
The
Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches,
…this perfect
life with the Most Holy Trinity this communion of life and love with the
Trinity, with the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed is called ‘heaven'.
Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfilment of the deepest human longings, the
state of supreme, definitive happiness. CCC.1024
Heaven – in the Holy Scriptures
·
Metaphorically speaking, heaven is understood as the
dwelling-place of God, who is thus distinguished from human beings (cf. Ps
104:2f.; 115:16; Is 66:1). He sees and judges from the heights of heaven (cf.
Ps 113:4-9) and comes down when he is called upon (cf. Ps 18:9, 10; 144:5).
However the biblical metaphor makes it clear that God does not identify himself
with heaven, nor can he be contained in it (cf. 1 Kgs 8:27); and this is true,
even though in some passages of the First Book of the Maccabees
"Heaven" is simply one of God's names.
·
The depiction of heaven as the transcendent dwelling-place of the
living God is joined with that of the place to which believers, through grace,
can also ascend, as we see in the Old Testament accounts of Enoch (cf. Gn 5:24)
and Elijah (cf. 2 Kgs 2:11). Thus heaven becomes an image of life in God. In
this sense Jesus speaks of a "reward in heaven" (Mt 5:12) and urges
people to "lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven" (ibid., 6:20;
cf. 19:21).
·
The New Testament amplifies the idea of heaven in relation to the
mystery of Christ. To show that the Redeemer's sacrifice acquires perfect and
definitive value, the Letter to the Hebrews says that Jesus "passed
through the heavens" (Heb 4:14), and "entered, not into a sanctuary
made with hands, a copy of the true one, but into heaven itself" (ibid.,
9:24). Since believers are loved in a special way by the Father, they are
raised with Christ and made citizens of heaven. It is worthwhile listening to
what the Apostle Paul tells us about this in a very powerful text: "God,
who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when
we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by
grace you have been saved), and raised us up with him, and made us sit with him
in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the coming ages he might show
the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ
Jesus" (Eph 2:4-7). The fatherhood of God, who is rich in mercy, is
experienced by creatures through the love of God's crucified and risen Son, who
sits in heaven on the right hand of the Father as Lord.
·
After the course of our earthly life, participation in full life
of communion with the Father thus comes through our insertion into Christ's
paschal mystery. St Paul emphasizes our meeting with Christ in heaven at the
end of time with a vivid spatial image: "Then we who are alive, who are
left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in
the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another
with these words" (1 Thes 4:17-18).
Sacramental
life is anticipation of heaven
·
In the context of Revelation, we know that the "heaven"
or "happiness" in which we will find ourselves is neither an
abstraction nor a physical place in the clouds, but a living, personal
relationship with the Holy Trinity. It is our meeting with the Father which
takes place in the risen Christ through the communion of the Holy Spirit.
·
It is always necessary to maintain a certain restraint in
describing these "ultimate realities" since their depiction is always
unsatisfactory.
·
The Catechism of the Catholic Church sums up the
Church's teaching on this truth: "By his death and Resurrection, Jesus
Christ has "opened' heaven to us. The life of the blessed consists in the
full and perfect possession of the fruits of the redemption accomplished by
Christ. He makes partners in his heavenly glorification those who have believed
in him and remained faithful to his will. Heaven is the blessed community of
all who are perfectly incorporated into Christ" (n. 1026).
Experiencing something of heaven now
·
This final state, however, can be anticipated in some way
today in sacramental life, whose centre is the Eucharist, and in the gift of
self through fraternal charity. If we are able to enjoy properly the good
things that the Lord showers upon us every day, we will already have begun to
experience that joy and peace which one day will be completely ours. We know
that on this earth everything is subject to limits, but the thought of the
"ultimate" realities helps us to live better the "penultimate"
realities. We know that as we pass through this world we are called to seek
"the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of
God" (Col 3:1), in order to be with him in the eschatological fulfilment,
when the Spirit will fully reconcile with the Father "all things, whether
on earth or in heaven" (Col 1:20).
“This is good and pleasing to God our
saviour, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the
truth.” 1 Timothy 2:3-4
WHAT
IS HELL?
·
THE
CONSEQUENCE OF THE GIFT OF FREE WILL: God is the infinitely good and merciful Father. But man, called to respond to
him freely, can unfortunately choose to reject his love and forgiveness
once and for all, thus separating himself forever from joyful communion with Him.
·
Before
death redemption remains an offer of salvation which it is up to people to
accept freely. This is why they will all be judged "by what they [have
done]" (Rv 20:13). After death there is no opportunity to change our mind.
·
Holy
Scripture has a developing understanding of what happens to the dead – in the
Old Testament it was gradually being revealed. In the New Testament hell is:-
·
a
fiery furnace, where people will "weep and gnash their teeth" (Mt
13:42; cf. 25:30, 41) ;
·
like
Gehenna with its "unquenchable fire" (Mk 9:43) ;
·
the
parable of the rich man - which explains that hell is a place of eternal
suffering, with no possibility of return, nor of the alleviation of pain (cf.
Lk. 16:19-3 1) ;
·
the
Book of Revelation also figuratively portrays in a "pool of fire"
those who exclude themselves from the book of life, thus meeting with a
"second death" (Rv. 20:13f.) ;
·
whoever
continues to be closed to the Gospel is therefore preparing for 'eternal destruction
and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might’ (2
Thes 1:9) ;
·
Rather
than a place as such, hell is the state of those who freely and definitively
separate themselves from God, who is the source of all life and joy;
To die in mortal
sin without repenting and accepting God's merciful love means remaining
separated from him forever by our own free choice. This state of definitive
self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called 'hell'. CCC1033
·
Eternal
damnation remains a real possibility, but we are not granted, without special
divine revelation, the knowledge of whether or which human beings are
effectively involved in it. The thought of hell — and even less the improper
use of biblical images — must not create anxiety or despair, but is a necessary
and healthy reminder of freedom within the proclamation that the risen Jesus
has conquered Satan. (Rm. 8:15; Gal. 4:6).
We are saved from going to hell by Jesus
who conquered Satan
·
Christian faith teaches that in taking the risk of saying
"yes" or "no", which marks the human creature's freedom,
some have already said no. They are the spiritual creatures that rebelled
against God's love and are called demons (cf. Fourth Lateran
Council, DS 800-801). What happened to them is a warning to us:
…it is a continuous call to avoid the tragedy which leads to sin
and to conform our life to that of Jesus who lived his life with a
"yes" to God.
